


would you have me, would you want me

by agreytracksuit



Category: Bridgerton (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Based on a Taylor Swift Song, F/M, Friends to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-30
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:15:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29082996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agreytracksuit/pseuds/agreytracksuit
Summary: Penelope Featherington and Colin Bridgerton are best friends. That is, until a romance with Marina Thompson threatens to ruin everything.
Relationships: Colin Bridgerton/Penelope Featherington
Comments: 4
Kudos: 124





	would you have me, would you want me

“Alright, everyone settle down while I take the role,” Ms Danbury announces to her homeroom, as they all continue talking over her.

Penelope’s hand shoots into the air and she glances intermittently at the door.

“Colin’s here, he just had to nip home and grab something,” she yells over the rest of the class, hand still in the air.

“If he’s at home, then he’s not here, is he Miss Featherington?” Ms Danbury calmly points out. Penelope grimaces and puts her hand down. She glances at the door once more before Ms Danbury dons her glasses and commences the role.

“I’m here!” Colin Bridgerton announces loudly, panting as he enters the classroom with his books. Ms Danbury gives him a stern look and adjusts the role as he takes his seat beside Penelope.

“Don’t do that to me again,” Penelope hisses when he sits down. Colin grins at her.

“It’s just homeroom Pen,” he tells her casually. “I think I can handle being marked late every now and then.” He gives her a wink and she rolls her eyes, trying to hide her smile.

“Are we still on for movie night then?” Penelope asks, changing the subject.

“Wouldn’t miss it! Just promise me it’s not another horror movie?” he says hopefully. Penelope chuckles.

“Of course not, that’s the last time I’m taking recommendations from Eloise,” she assures him. The bell rings and the class starts shuffling out of the room while Ms Danbury continues trying to talk to them over the sound of their chattering.

“I’ll see you tonight then,” Colin says to Penelope with another wink. He turns down the hall towards his next class and Penelope smiles after him, heart fluttering in her chest.

* * *

At just after 8pm, there’s a knocking on the door of the Featherington house. Penelope almost gallops down the stairs in excitement.

“I’ll get it!” she calls to the rest of her family, none of whom had made any sort of move to get the door. They know that Tuesdays are movie night for Colin and Penelope, and none of them are inclined to answer the door regardless unless they know someone’s coming to see them.

Penelope opens the door a little breathlessly after her sprint to get there. Colin grins when he sees her, holding up several packets of snacks, both sweet and salty.

“Evening, Pen,” Colin greets her. Penelope beams at him in delight, stepping aside and gesturing for him to enter.

“Late twice in one day,” she teases as he steps inside the house. She closes the door and they both make their way upstairs to her room. “This is becoming a habit.”

Colin looks at his phone to check the time and rolls his eyes playfully at her when he sees how late he is. “It’s 8.07, Pen,” he tells her. “That’s hardly late. Besides, I had to stop and get snacks. Surely that makes up for it?”

Colin gives her a pleading look as Penelope feigns disappointment. She sighs dramatically. “Very well, I forgive you. But only because I can see you’ve brought scorched peanuts.”

She snatches the bag from his hand and steps into her room ahead of him. She’s already set the room up, the Netflix logo paused on the screen, lights dimmed, and pillows positioned perfectly for them each to lie on.

“So,” Colin says, bouncing onto the bed and landing on his side with his head leaning on his hand. He looks almost seductive in that position, Penelope thinks, but she quickly shakes the thought. They’re just friends, she reminds herself. “What movie are we watching?”

Penelope crawls onto the bed and Colin readjusts himself to make room. They lie on their stomachs, shoulders touching, with the snack pile between them at the edge of the bed.

“It’s the second Kissing Booth movie,” Penelope replies with a mischievous smile. Colin raises an eyebrow at her and Penelope giggles.

“Was it not enough that you put me through the first one?” he asks. “Must you torture me again? And I thought we agreed, no horror?”

“I thought it would be fun to make fun of it,” she says defensively, still smiling. “We did like poking holes in the first one.” Colin sighs.

“Very well,” he agrees reluctantly. “But I will remember this, and I will have my revenge.”

Penelope rolls her eyes at him and plays the movie. She is right; they do have fun poking fun at it, and she decides that it’s actually more fun than their usual movie nights.

“Okay, I will admit that was fun,” Colin concedes as the credits roll. “But next time, I pick the movie.”

Penelope crosses her arms and looks at him like he’s an idiot. “Yes, that’s how our movie nights work,” she reminds him. He flashes her a cheeky grin and she rolls her eyes at him for what seems like the millionth time tonight. Colin moves to get up and Penelope turns the TV off. She helps him gather up what’s left of the snacks and he looks around briefly to make sure he’s got everything.

“Right, Miss Featherington, it’s been a pleasure as always,” Colin says. Penelope nods formally at him.

“Likewise, Mr Bridgerton,” she replies. They relax into smiles and Colin salutes his goodbye. Penelope waves in response, but she wishes she could ask him to stay. It’s not like her parents would even care if he did. They don’t see her as the kind of daughter who would actually get up to no good with a boy in her room. They barely see her at all. She and Colin are just friends anyway, she reminds herself. There’s no way something could ever happen between them. As much as she wishes it would.

* * *

To Penelope’s surprise, when she gets to homeroom the next morning Colin is already there, and he is sitting next to a beautiful girl she has never seen before. She pauses in the doorway, taken aback, and hesitantly walks over to take her usual seat next to her best friend.

“Morning Pen,” Colin greets her cheerfully. “This is Marina, she’s new here.”

Marina gives Penelope a small wave and Penelope smiles in return.

“Lovely to meet you,” she says to Marina through gritted teeth, plastering on a polite smile. “What brings you to our humble town?”

“My dad wanted me to get a better education, says my last school was full of potheads and dropkicks,” Marina explains. “Colin was just being so kind as to tell me about your lovely little town. He even invited me to the movies tonight. You should come with us!”

Penelope gives Marina the fakest smile she can muster, her stomach twisting in a mix of jealousy and dread. “That’s so kind, but I’ve… already seen them,” she lies. Marina stares at her blankly while Colin furrows his brow in confusion.

“You’ve seen… all of the movies?” Marina queries dumbly.

“That’s right,” Penelope says, standing her ground. “Thank you for the offer though. Now, I really must go or I’ll be late for class.”

The bell hasn’t gone yet, but Penelope knows that if she stays in the classroom a second longer she’s going to say or do something incredibly stupid. Colin calls after her, but she doesn’t slow down. She can hear his footsteps hurrying to catch up with her before he stands in front of her, blocking the way.

“Please move,” Penelope tells him, refusing to make eye contact with him. But Colin doesn’t budge.

“What on Earth happened in there?” Colin demands. Penelope doesn’t speak. Colin softens, and gently puts his hand on Penelope’s shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. I really need to get going now,” Penelope says coldly. She brushes Colin’s hand away and continues on the path to her next class.

Penelope has dreaded this moment for a long time. Since primary school, she and Colin have been best friends, and for the longest time she has had him all to herself. Whether it was because no one else was interested, or they knew Penelope had some kind of dibs, she couldn’t be sure. But now that there is a new girl, who’s first meeting was with sweet, caring Colin, Penelope has no doubt in her mind that her relationship with Colin won’t remain the same.

* * *

The next few days are exactly as Penelope predicts they will be; Colin fawning over Marina and barely paying any attention to her. She still sits in her normal seat in homeroom, but she feels like a ghost with those two all over each other. It’s more than she can bear. It isn’t until Colin cancels their Tuesday movie night, however, that she decides she has had enough.

**Hey, can’t make it tonight. Going out with Marina. Rain check?**

Penelope reads the text over and over again. She starts typing a reply but ultimately decides that Colin couldn’t possibly care what she has to say. Not when he can’t have the decency to say it to her face. She storms to the front office, nearly in tears but trying to remain calm and collected so that she will be taken seriously.

“I need to change homerooms,” Penelope demands of the office administrator. The woman at the desk looks up at her blankly.

“Why?” she asks in a bored tone. Penelope takes a deep breath, trying to come up with a reason good enough that her request will be granted.

“I… My current homeroom is too far from the rest of my classes,” she lies. “I’m constantly running late and it’s becoming a real issue.” She’s surprised at the calmness of her own voice. She certainly doesn’t feel as sure as her words sound. The office administrator raises an eyebrow curiously but starts to type something on her computer.

“You know, I do believe Miss Featherington could benefit from a change of homerooms,” Ms Danbury says knowingly, appearing from the supply room at the back of the office. She offers Penelope an encouraging smile. “Leave it with me, Penelope. I’ll have you moved to Mr Berbrooke’s class in time for tomorrow morning.”

Penelope smiles gratefully at Ms Danbury, and as she turns away the tears start to roll down her cheeks without her permission. She gets out her phone and hastily types a text to Eloise.

**Movie night tonight?**

* * *

Penelope is relieved that Eloise has no other plans for the evening. She desperately needs something to take her mind off Colin and Marina, and a movie is the perfect thing for it. She tries not to think about the fact that it should be Colin sharing this with her as Eloise positions herself comfortably on Penelope’s bed. Normally it would be her turn to go to the Bridgerton house, but she wanted to avoid all possibility of running into Colin and Marina as they came and went for their date.

“Do you want to tell me the reason I’m here on a Tuesday night instead of you being at our house in our very large and comfortable lounge room?” Eloise asks, getting to the point. “Or am I going to have to drag it out of you?”

Penelope sighs. “Colin has been spending an awful lot of time with that new Marina girl,” she explains, trying to hide the jealousy in her voice. “He even went so far as to cancel movie night.”

“Oh dear,” Eloise says playfully, not grasping how serious this is to Penelope. “How very awful of him to miss one movie night out of a million.”

Penelope gives her a wry smile. “It’s just not like him, is all,” she says, completely downplaying her feelings. She can tell that Eloise doesn’t understand at all, and talking to her about it won’t make anything better.

Eloise turns out to be wrong, anyway. It’s not just one movie night. It’s two, and then three. She avoids him at school, not that he would even notice with how busy he is shoving his tongue down Marina’s throat. The only time Penelope hears from Colin is the day she starts her new homeroom.

**You’re not here? Do you hate me?**

He texts. Penelope rolls her eyes when she sees it.

**No, just needed a change.**

She doesn’t explain any further, and all Colin responds with is a thumbs up.

* * *

It’s been four weeks since the arrival of Marina when an unexpected tapping on the door startles Penelope as she studies in the dining room. She looks around to see if any of her family are around to answer is, but no one stirs at the noise.

Penelope slowly makes her way to the door and is completely caught off guard when it’s Colin that she sees in the doorway. She looks around behind him, almost expecting to see Marina with him.

“Yeah, it’s just me today,” he says sheepishly, absently rubbing the back of his head. Penelope stops looking around and closes the door slightly so that he can’t try and get through.

“What do you want, Colin?” she demands.

“I want to talk to you,” Colin begins, and Penelope scoffs.

“Well there’s something I didn’t think I’d hear you ever say again,” she says dramatically.

“Come on, Pen,” he begs. “You’ve been avoiding me for weeks.”

“I’m surprised you noticed,” Penelope spits. “Although for your information, I haven’t been avoiding you, I’ve just been busy.” It’s a blatant lie and they both know it, but she’ll be damned if he makes her feel bad about avoiding him when he was the one who started ignoring her first.

“I want you to get to know Marina more,” Colin continues, ignoring Penelope’s bold-faced lie. “I really think you two would get along, and she doesn’t have any female friends yet.”

Penelope cocks her head at him as if he’s the stupidest boy alive, and in that moment she truly believes it. “Has she considered speaking to other women?” she suggests sarcastically. Her heart is racing, and not in the usual way it does around Colin. This time it’s from pure fury. “I know I’d have difficulty making friends too if all I did with my time was snog the only person I bothered to meet when I moved towns.”

Colin folds his arms defensively. “Wow Pen, that was a low blow,” he scolds. “I thought of all people you would be the one to understand.”

“Did you?” she asks condescendingly. “I’m surprised you thought of me at all, what with all of the ignoring me you’ve been doing lately.”

Colin is starting to turn red with rage and Penelope is on the verge of tears, again. “You know what, Pen? Maybe if you weren’t so obsessed with me you could actually be friends with my girlfriend, instead of being this jealous loner you’ve become.”

He looks taken aback at the force of his own words, and his face almost immediately changes to apologetic. But it’s too late, the damage is done. Penelope feels as though her heart has been torn into a million pieces, and not just because she has lost the man she thought she loved, but she has also just lost her best friend.

“I don’t know why you would say something so unforgivably hurtful,” she says quietly. The tears are threatening to fall now, but she refuses to cry in front of him. “Get the hell out of my house. I never want to see you again.” Her tone is low and even, despite all the emotions she seems to be feeling that are causing her entire body to shake. Without waiting for a response, Penelope slams the door in Colin’s face and slides her back down it to sit on the hard tiled floor as the tears start flowing. She can hardly breathe for crying, but it doesn’t matter. Her whole body is numb with emotion and all she can think about is how everything fell apart so easily.

* * *

It isn’t long after the argument that Colin and Marina break up. It seems Marina’s quite taken with a boy named George from her Spanish class. Penelope immediately wishes she could reconcile with him, to see if he’s okay after the break up and have things go back to the way they were. But he’s hurt her too much, and she doesn’t think she could bear the heartache of speaking to him again.

So instead of Colin helping her plan her seventeenth birthday, it’s Eloise. Which would be fine, except that Eloise seems to think that everyone wants the same things she does and has completely taken over the party planning.

“I’m thinking we invite everyone from school, just make it the biggest birthday possible. Think of all of the secrets that will form in that enormous house of yours,” Eloise is saying as they sit on the grass and eat their lunch. Penelope is done fighting her on things. She isn’t likely to enjoy her birthday anyway, with the way things have been going lately.

“Sure, just make sure you don’t invite your brother,” she mutters in response.

“Well I’m certain Anthony wouldn’t want to come anyway,” Eloise jokes, trying to elicit a smile from her friend. It doesn’t work, so she abruptly becomes serious. “I’m so sorry Colin said those awful things to you. He really had no right. We can send him a specific dis-invitation, just to rub his nose in it. I don’t know where he got the idea that you’re obsessed with him, anyway. You two were friends for Christ’s sake! I would never go so far as to say you’re obsessed with me, just as I am not with you!”

Penelope sighs and looks at Eloise pointedly. “Eloise, you truly are one of the most unobservant people I have ever met. We have been friends for how long now, and you are still too blind to the most obvious things!”

Eloise’s face drops in shock and she looks at Penelope almost blankly. “You mean, you really are obsessed with him?” she asks in complete seriousness. Penelope rolls her eyes.

“Obsessed is certainly too strong a word,” she says. “But I’ve been in love with him for as long as I can remember.”

Eloise pulls Penelope into a tight hug. “Oh my dear friend, I’m so sorry. I wish that there was something I could do to cure the hurt.”

And Penelope wishes that, too.

* * *

It’s the night of her seventeenth birthday, and while it seems everyone from school is having the time of their lives drinking and partying, Penelope is sitting alone with a completely full cup of punch in front of her. Eloise makes her way towards her and plops herself down on the seat beside her, offering her the full cup. Penelope shakes her head.

“Come on, I know it’s not what you wanted or expected, but can you please at least try to have a good time?” Eloise begs, already quite tipsy and speaking much louder than usual because of it.

“It’s my party, and if I want to be alone and miserable, I shall,” Penelope insists, folding her arms across her chest like a petulant child. Eloise rolls her eyes and puts the cup back on the table so that she can pull Penelope to her feet.

“Just one dance, best friend, and then we can sit outside by ourselves and mope about our tragic love lives,” Eloise demands. Penelope reluctantly allows herself to be pulled to the makeshift dancefloor where the dining room table used to be, and starts to swing her hips in time to the music. Eloise’s eyes are closed as she sways and moves her arms rhythmically. She looks ridiculous, and Penelope can’t help but laugh. She must admit, it feels good to smile again. Eloise grabs Penelope’s hand and spins her around the dancefloor, both of them grinning in delight.

Penelope’s actually having a good time, so much so that she doesn’t hear the door open and close, and she doesn’t see her former best friend approach her until he’s standing directly in front of her. She jumps in surprise at the sight of him, and he’s smiling at her as though nothing has changed between them.

As soon as she’s collected herself from the surprise, Penelope starts brimming with fury.

“Happy birthday, Pen,” he says, holding his hand out for her to shake as if they’ve just agreed on a car sale. Penelope glowers at him, her teeth gritted.

“Go fuck yourself, Colin Bridgerton,” she spits. She turns on her heel and storms out of the room, making her way to the garden where she can finally get some air. She can sense someone following her, and hopes to God it’s Eloise, and not Colin.

She’s disappointed, however, when she reaches the garden and finally turns around.

“Can we please just talk, Pen?” Colin says a little breathlessly.

“You don’t get to ignore me for weeks on end, insult me in the worst way imaginable, then just show up to my party and expect me to want to talk to you!” Penelope snaps, turning a little red from the rage.

“I know, Pen, but if you’d just listen…” he sighs and puts his hands behind his head in frustration, like he doesn’t know how to put to words what he’s trying to say. “Look, Marina was just a fling.”

Penelope scoffs. “Yeah, no shit,” she says angrily. “What, she dumps you for someone else and suddenly you want to hang out with me again? Is this going to happen every time you get a girlfriend? You’re just going to cast me aside and expect me to wait around until she dumps you? It’s not good enough, Colin! I’m not going to-“

“I broke up with her!” Colin interrupts. Penelope stares at him in disbelief, breathing quite heavily after getting herself riled up.

“What?” she says softly.

“After our argument… after what I said, I realised that she was toxic for me,” he explains slowly, trying to find the right words. “And I didn’t want to be with her, not if meant I couldn’t be with you and I…”

He trails off and Penelope’s heart skips a beat. Did he mean to phrase it that way? Surely he just means as a friend. But he’s looking at her like he’s said something he wasn’t meant to, and she can barely breathe with him looking into her eyes like that. It’s like time has stopped.

“And you?” Penelope prompts, not wanting to put him off. She feels so close to him suddenly, and if he can just say what she needs him to say then none of the other stuff will have mattered.

“Shit, Pen,” Colin curses. “Well, I’m in love with you, aren’t I? I was a fool not to see it before.”

Penelope beams at him and takes a step toward him, closing the distance between them.

“You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear that,” she whispers happily. Colin grins at her. He gently brushes her chin with his finger, tilting her face toward him. Slowly, he bends to meet her, and their lips touch.

“I’m hoping this means you forgive me,” Colin says softly, his nose still touching hers.

“Obviously,” Penelope breathes back, and Colin pulls her into another kiss, both of them smiling in pure bliss.


End file.
